Between the Realms (3 page)

"I am possessing him, mind and body.
 
The only thing I have yet to take is his soul.
 
I have you to thank for that."

"You don't look very grateful," I said, shifting my weight from my left foot to my right, wondering what a person does with a possessing demon to get him out of the place he shouldn't be, worried stabbing Spike's body would end his life, regardless of the fact that his soul was still his own.

"Truly, I am not thankful.
 
But now that I have been in his mind and felt you against me, I know that I can go no further with this possession."

"Say
what
, now?"
 
One minute the guy was a happy demon, the next he's a lovesick idiot.
 
I thought fae left this shit behind when they died, but apparently not.

"A love this strong and abiding is a rare thing.
 
I cannot destroy it without ruining my chances at another lifetime in the Here and Now.
 
I must leave you now and return from whence I came."
 
He turned as if to leave.

"Wait a minute!"
 
I was panicking.
 
He'd taken Spike's mind and body and now was going to just walk away with it?
 
Over my dead body!
 
"You're not going anywhere, dude.
 
I want to know how the hell you did this and where Spike really is.
 
You can't just disappear on me."

He smiled at me sadly.
 
"I believe I can."
 
He walked away quickly disappearing into the trees, leaving me standing there alone.

But I wasn't that way for long.
 
Just after Spike began walking, I heard the sounds of Tim's wings, and then a moment after that, his voice, singing.

"Duh.
 
Duh.
 
Duh. ... Another one bites my dust!
 
And another one gone and another one gone!
 
Another one bites my pixie dust!"

I saw him flying past the slowly trudging Spike who didn't even look up to acknowledge the pixie going by.

"Oh, hey, Spike," said Tim as he buzzed past him.
 
Then he spoke to me.
 
"Greetings, my liege.
 
Did you call for me?
 
Did you miss me?
 
Do you need me to guide you back to the battle?
 
You seem to have lost your way over here.
 
You know, people are going to think you're off snogging the incubus while everyone else fights off the demons.
 
That's not going to look very good on your CV."

I met him halfway to Spike.
 
"Not now, Tim.
 
We have to stop him."
 
I walked as fast as I could, worried that if I ran, I'd spook him and he'd turn on the turbos and disappear.

Tim hovered in front of me, turning to face Spike.
 
"Him who?
 
Spike?"

"It's not Spike!
 
It's a friggin demon possessing him."
 
I tripped over a fallen branch and went down on my knees.
 
I jumped back up and didn't even bother wiping the dead leaves off me.

"Holy pixie private parts!
 
Are you kidding me?"
 
Tim flew out towards the demon and then seemed to change his mind, coming back to stop near my face.
 
"That's messed up.
 
You should go stab him with your fang.
 
I'll wait back here and supervise."

"No, we can't!
 
He's got Spike's body.
 
That's the
real
Spike only with a demon soul inside.
 
I think.
 
It's kind of confusing."
 
My legs were burning with the effort of fast-walking through piles of leaves and small tree parts.

I picked up my pace, now jogging so I could keep Spike in view.
 
He could put on the supersonic speed at any point and lose me, so I was hoping I could come up with a plan before that happened.
 
My legs felt better jogging than they had with the crazy fast-walking.

"What are you going to do?" asked Tim near my shoulder.
 
"Just follow him?
 
What kind of a plan is that?"

"He's going to get away from me.
 
He's too fast.
 
I need to do something else but I don't know what it is.
 
I just know that if I lose him I will have no way of finding him again and then maybe we'll never get Spike back."
 
The idea of losing my incubus friend was too awful to consider seriously.
 
I was not going to let this guy get away from me no matter what.
 
The battle was important, I knew that.
 
But the green elves and Dardennes along with the few ogres I'd seen fighting on our side could manage without me for a few more minutes while I dealt with this problem.

Tim was trying to help me figure out our next move.
 
"Well ... you can't stab him, and you can't catch him.
 
Seems to me you have only one option left.
 
Or maybe two."

"What are they?"
 
I was breathless from my efforts at pursuit now.

"Okay, well, number one is to flash him your boobs.
 
Stun him."

"Tim, that's not going to work."
 
I wanted to bat him out of the sky, but I had to conserve my energy for breathing.

"You're right.
 
They're way too small.
 
Okay, option number two, let me pixie his stupid butt."

I growled my frustration.
 
"My boobs are not too small, number one, and two, pixying is a bad idea."

"Why?
 
There's a cure now.
 
If I zap him, he'll stop running away, and then we can contain him until the medics arrive.
 
It's a win-win, Lellamental.
 
Please
, let me pixie him.
 
I've been sober far too long."
 
Tim was rubbing his hands together and staring longingly off into the distance.

I stopped running, unable to come up with any more reasons not to let Tim fall off the wagon.
 
I gasped the words out.
 
"Fine.
 
Go pixie his demon ass.
 
But don't get any of your butt dust on anyone else."
 
I bent over, pulling in copious amounts of oxygen, trying to feed my starved brain.

"Your wish is my command.
 
And for the record, it's not
butt dust
, okay?
 
It's
body dust.
 
Stay back so the wind doesn't get any on you.
 
My shit is
potent,
just like my man-seed.
"

"That is just gross," I mumbled, watching Tim fly superhero-style up to Spike's back and over his head.
 
Once he was there, he slowed down and spun around to face him, halting in midair about two feet from Spike's chest.
 
He threw his arms out in the demon's direction, as if saying,
'Tah-dahhhh!'
 
After he stayed like that for about five seconds, he flew up again, hovering a few feet above Spike's head.

Nothing happened at first, other than Spike stopping in his tracks.
 
Then he lifted up his arms slowly at his sides.
 
He remained like that for long enough that I started to wonder what the hell he was doing.

I walked forward a few steps, trying to get a better view of what was going on.

Spike's arms slowly bent at the elbows and came in closer to his body.

I took a few more steps towards him.
 
I was about twenty feet away now, my breathing back to normal but the sweat running down the sides of my face.

I watched as Spike's butt started to twitch back and forth.
 
And boy, did he have a nice one.

Tim's proud announcer-voice rang out.
 
"Watch out, ladies and gentlefae!
 
We've got ourselves a live one over here!
 
Whoo-hoooo!"
 
He flew backwards for a distance and then turned and buzzed away, singing loudly about another one biting his pixie dust.

The demon-Spike and I were alone again on the border of the trees near the scene of the battle that I could now hear still going on, the sounds of swords clanging together and men yelling and grunting echoing all around us.
 
He seemed oblivious to it all, as he took a step back and then one forward, his butt moving side to side and his arms pumping in and out.
 
It was like he either couldn't decide which way to go or he was having a small seizure standing up; I couldn't decide which.

"What the fuck?" I said, mostly to myself.
 
Then louder I said, "Hey, Spike!
 
What are you doing?"

He turned around, his face full of manic happiness as he broke out into more dance maneuvers.
 
There was no music, but his arms and legs moved in what appeared to be a carefully and professionally choreographed routine, designed to get every girl within viewing distance breathing a little faster.
 
Now that he had his rhythm, I could see that the boy could seriously bust a move.

"Come on, Jayne," he shouted.
 
"Come on over here and cut a rug with me."
 
He threw a leg out to the side and then dragged it back in, doing a weird shimmy with his spine and then popping and locking a little.
 
It should have looked totally stupid, but somehow he managed to pull it off.
 
I was reminded of a recent stripper movie starring one of the hottest guys to ever walk the planet, and had to quickly shake images of a mostly nude, dancing Spike out of my head before I go too attached to the idea.

"Cut a rug?
 
I don't think so."
 
I moved as if to walk a large circle around him, but his eyes locked onto mine and his dance moves slowed.

"Where are you going, Jayne?" he asked, tipping his head down and slowing his moves a little, looking up at me through his eyelashes intently.
 
I was reminded of a cougar about to pounce on its prey.
 
A very sexy one.

My heart was racing again, trying to beat itself out of my chest.
 
"I'm going back to the battle.
 
Why don't you stay here and dance for a while, and I'll come back for you later."
 
I felt fairly certain he would stick around, or at least be easier to find, now that his main goal was to dance the day away and not to escape from me.
 
That would give me some time to get back to demon ass-kicking with my friends, and I could come collect this Spike imposter later for the witches to deal with.

"Why don't you just stay and dance
with
me?"
 
He said, moving towards me, using his dance rhythm to propel himself forward in perfect time to his inner beat.
 
Now he was like a sexy
disco
cougar which was hilarious and terrifying at the same time.
 
I felt like I was in the middle of a really goofy music video from the eighties, only with a demon as the star and me as his prey.

I looked from him to the spot where I thought I could get out of the trees and back with my friends.
 
If I was going to get away from him, I knew I had to go now.
 
I had no idea whether he'd be able to use his super speeds while he was pixelated or not, and I didn't want to find out when it would be too late.

I ran as fast as I could for the tree line, my breath pushing out of me as desperate huffs and puffs.
 
My legs that had quit burning just moments before started up again, my muscles complaining with every stride.

He came crashing in the brush behind me.
 
His hyper-speed didn't seem to be working, because if it had been, he would have already been on me within a second of me starting to run, but I was staying ahead.

I was panting louder and louder as the panic of being chased set in.
 
Adrenaline coursed through my veins, giving me speed I didn't know I had.
 
I got a cramp in my side and my chest was burning with the effort of escaping this dancing nut job.

Spike was close behind now, laughing and yelling out in his pixelated joy.
 
The dust hadn't made him harmless.
 
Apparently, it just made him more determined to kiss me than he had been earlier.
 
And I knew this time, there would be no brakes applied by him.
 
If he caught me, I was going down.
 
Like
all the way
down.

"Jayne, I love you!
 
Come back to me, beautiful girl!
 
Let us dance together!
 
Let me sing you a song that I wrote for you!"

 
Holy shit, I seriously prefer the more modest Spike.
 
I could see Dardennes in the distance, using a shining silver sword against a guy who looked like a fae.
 
Vampire
, I thought, ready to go lend him a hand, assuming I could somehow lose my pixelated loverboy.

Before I could get within shouting distance of my allies with any hope of being heard over the sounds of the fighting, I felt something hard hit my shoulder.
 
I was stopped abruptly by the force of it and went down to my knees.
 
I had hoped to catch myself there, but the momentum and the demon's follow-up was too much.
 
I continued down to the forest floor on my face as a heavy weight landed on me, hitting me in the back and making it impossible for me to do anything but eat dirt.